Bold music composition by Roosevelt University student caps celebration at Auditorium Theatre

"It is the first time we’ve had one of our student’s compositions performed as part of CCPA’s VIVID celebration, and we are proud of this work, which is extremely dynamic." Teddy NiedermaierAssociate Professor of Core Music Studies

The piece entitled Trilogy by Mitch Weakley of Beecher, Illinois is one of the highlights of a milestone celebration for CCPA – and one of the best four minutes of the Roosevelt graduate music composition student’s life.

“Music for me is all about the sound, and I’m so proud to be able to showcase this work for the Roosevelt community and beyond,” said Weakley, a 26-year-old award-winning music composer who began playing trumpet, piano and double bass while growing up in Kankakee County’s Grant Park. Weakley began composing music in high school and graduated from Grant Park High School in Kankakee County in 2010.

Since then, the young composer has won accolades as winner of Roosevelt’s 2017-18 Contemporary Ensemble Composition Competition, the 2017 Michael Hall Composition Competition, the 2016-17 Wind Ensemble Composition Competition, and the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States (SEAMUS) 2015 Allen Strange Memorial Award.

To date, Weakley has written more than 20 compositions including Trilogy, the dramatic four-minute piece that he began as an undergraduate music student at Eastern Illinois University, and which will have its premiere at the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago on March 14.

A piano concerto performed by the CCPA Chamber Orchestra and soloist CCPA faculty member Winston Choi and a Broadway revue of song, dance and spoken work featuring Roosevelt theatre students also are part of the milestone event called VIVID 2018.

“This is an exciting moment for the Music Composition Department at Roosevelt’s Chicago College of Performing Arts. It is the first time we’ve had one of our student’s compositions performed as part of CCPA’s VIVID celebration, and we are proud of this work, which is extremely dynamic,” said Teddy Niedermaier, associate professor of core music studies at Roosevelt.

In the mid-80s, Ron Kubit (Computer Science ’84) noticed that computers were taking off. Although he already had an accounting degree from the University of Dayton, Kubit "wasn't about to let the world pass him by," and so he enrolled in Roosevelt University's Computer Science program.